TVs Are Internet Ready/Game Consoles and Set Top Accessories like Roku and Chromecast Stream Content

Vast numbers of consumers are dropping their costly cable and satellite TV subscriptions and relying heavily on internet-based streaming apps instead. Consumers in the under-35 age group are especially likely to bypass expensive cable or satellite subscriptions. The fact that TV sets are internet-ready is adding fuel to this trend.

Internet-connected TVs boost consumers’ options in news and entertainment, and they enable quick access to games on TV screens. Samsung Electronics, Vizio and LG Electronics, among others, are all offering smart, internet-connected TVs that feature apps linked to streaming content. By 2025, streaming apps were accounting for about 47% of viewers’ attention. That market share will continue to grow rapidly.

The Streaming Age: A Massive Shift in the Way that Americans Spend their TV and Viewing Time

The leading TV audience tracking firm is Nielsen. Its analysts estimated that streaming services (including multiple options such as Peacock, YouTube and Sling, as well as film production firms’ own services at Disney and its competitors) accounted for nearly 50% of American viewers’ time in July 2025, with broadcast TV achieving only a 20% audience share and cable only about 24%. The remaining 5% went to viewing films on DVD players and electronic gaming. Streaming options are varied, with some focused on specific types of content, such as ESPN’s streaming sports coverage. This seemingly unstoppable trend has been made possible only by the advent of very fast internet to-the-home and high-speed wireless connections on-the-go.

Giant film production companies like Disney see a competitive advantage in their ability to hold their most exciting or newest movies for distribution on their own streaming platforms, rather than on cable. Giant media companies are scrambling to determine how to best stay relevant in the Streaming Age. Top executives at companies that own leading broadcast TV networks are thinking about selling or spinning off the networks so they can better concentrate on streaming.

Cable and satellite pay TV companies likewise are adapting to change while they lose hundreds of thousands of household subscribers each year. By 2025, the number of U.S. pay TV households had plummeted to about 49.6 million, from about 100 million ten years earlier. They have been emphasizing their internet service provider (ISP) business offerings, bringing fast internet to the home and office, as well as their own versions of mobile phone subscription services. Cable giant Charter Communications is offering its customers a device called Xumo that helps them stream live TV through an app, intended to be used just like other streaming TV apps like ESPN+ and Disney+. The cable set-top box may soon be a thing of the past. Comcast, another massive cable firm, is rapidly growing its Peacock streaming service while its cable subscriptions slip.

Competition from Netflix: Netflix.com began as one of the largest movie and TV show rental sites in the world, reaching a record 325 million subscribers worldwide as of early 2026. For a monthly subscription fee, users enjoy streaming an unlimited number of movies. Netflix’s business model initially was based on mailing DVD copies of movies to its subscribers. This was a costly business, involving multiple warehouses and massive postage and handling expenses. At a rapid pace, however, the firm invested in state-of-the-art technology to enable it to focus on streaming via the internet. Netflix shipped its last DVD in late 2023. Playback of a Netflix streaming movie starts a few seconds after download begins. Subscribers instantly watch movies and TV episodes streamed over the internet.

The Netflix streaming content library includes media acquired through deals with corporations such as: ABC, Nickelodeon, Twentieth Century Fox, Paramount, Miramax, Lionsgate, MGM and CBS, among others. Additionally, through its Netflix Originals division, the company produces content available exclusively on Netflix, which continues to rack up growing numbers of Emmy nominations and wins. The company invests billions in new film production each year.

Netflix’s effort to shift to streaming video not only is cost effective, it is also positioned the company to take on cable channels such as HBO and Showtime. Operating on a business model dramatically different from those of cable TV channels, Netflix became a true web-based entertainment platform, highly competitive with traditional cable networks and systems.

Sling, Amazon and Other Streaming Competitors: DISH Network offers Sling TV, a moderately priced streaming internet-based service targeting young, mobile-intense viewers who refuse to subscribe to cable TV. Sling TV, which had about 2 million subscribers as of the fourth quarter of 2025, offers some of the most popular cable networks including the Food Network, HGTV, TNT, TBS, ESPN and CNN (but broadcast networks ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox are not included). Vital differences from cable TV subscriptions include no long-term contract, a vastly lower monthly fee (in exchange for a much smaller selection of channels), no credit check and no need for additional hardware. Sling is working to innovate more quickly, adding discovery+ to its list of streaming providers and rolling out Sports Scores, a listing of scores across many major sports while watching live content.

Meanwhile, streaming service YouTube TV had over 10 million subscribers as of late 2025, up from an estimated 4 million subscribers in 2021. Hulu + Live TV had 4.4 million. Roku, Inc. began by manufacturing home digital media products. The company’s digital media players connect users to streaming content, enable content publishers to build and monetize large audiences and provide advertisers with unique capabilities to engage consumers. The firm also offers the Roku Channel offering ad-supported video-on-demand in the U.S., Canada and the UK, which generates the bulk of the company’s revenue. Roku surpassed 90 million active accounts as of early 2025.

Disney+ offers TV and movie programing from all Disney brands including Pixar, Marvel and Star Wars. The service had 131.6 million subscribers in late 2025. The company has two additional streaming services, ESPN+ and Hulu (Disney, which previously owned a two-thirds stake of Hulu, acquired the remaining one-third from Comcast in June 2025. The deal is valued at approximately $9 billion.).

Paramount+ is a subscription-based video streaming service from Paramount Global that offers over 40,000 episodes and movies on-demand, live TV (including local CBS stations in the premium plan), and exclusive original content. It features content from CBS, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, BET, MTV and VH1, as well as live sports like the NFL and UEFA Champions League.

In August 2021, AT&T spun off its DirecTV, AT&T TV and U-verse businesses into a single entity called DIRECTV. In July 2025, AT&T sold its remaining 70% stake in the company to private equity firm TPG Capital (which previously owned 30% of the business) for $7.6 billion. In November 2024, a proposed merger of DIRECTV and Dish Network was cancelled.

Apple is also spending heavily to produce TV programming, and its budget is likely to grow quickly. Apple TV+ launched in November 2019, undercutting several of its rivals on price (one-year access is free to customers buying a new Apple device).

Amazon Prime Video offers a vast selection of titles instantly. The company has expanded its video services to more than 200 countries and territories, and offers live NFL Thursday Night Football games in the U.S. Amazon’s budget for production of unique content was an estimated $22.4 billion in 2025 in an ongoing effort to compete with Netflix. Amazon is having a dramatic impact on the streaming films sector, with its big budget productions. It paid $250 million for the rights to produce new Lord of the Rings episodes and invested a total of $715 million in the project’s first season.

Comcast owns NBCUniversal and the Peacock streaming video service. NBCUniversal manages NBC, Telemundo, Universal Pictures, DreamWorks Animation and Universal Destinations & Experiences (theme parks). Peacock offers over 15,000 hours of NBC programming and movie classics, plus new original content such as Poker Face and The Traitors. As of early 2026, Peacock had 44 million subscribers.

Home Entertainment: Home entertainment clusters now include TVs, sound systems, game consoles, smartphones, tablets, digital assistants like Siri and Alexa and computers. The faster the download speed, the better. In an increasing number of newly constructed neighborhoods, access is achieved by fiber to the home (FTTH) networks capable of delivery at blazing speeds. Within the home, the latest versions of Bluetooth and Wi-Fi make it easy to access entertainment wirelessly from every room. Verizon, Comcast and AT&T are among the leaders in this field in the U.S. Meanwhile, Google Fiber, AT&T and Ziply Fiber are setting a new standard in selected cities by offering 2,000 Mbps to 10,000 Mbps connections, roughly 20 to 100 times typical high-speed internet rates.

While slipping, cable TV is far from dead. Paramount Network had a massively successful series called Yellowstone, which ended with its fifth season in December 2024. In addition to cable, the show was licensed for viewing on certain streaming services, including Amazon Prime Video, Hulu and Sling, but viewers were required to pay extra fees or have a premium level of service. Paramount’s popular Landman series, developed by the same creator as Yellowstone, was renewed for its third season in 2026.

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